I’m gonna tell you a story
I’m gonna tell you about my town
I’m gonna tell you a big bad story, baby
Aww, it’s all about my town

Yeah, down by the river
Down by the banks of the river Charles (aw, that’s what’s happenin’ baby)
That’s where you’ll find me
Along with lovers, fuggers, and thieves (aw, but they’re cool people)
Well I love that dirty water
Oh, Boston, you’re my home (oh, you’re the Number One place)
Frustrated women (I mean they’re frustrated)
Have to be in by twelve o’clock (oh, that’s a shame)
But I’m wishin’ and a-hopin, oh
That just once those doors weren’t locked (I like to save time for
my baby to walk around)
Well I love that dirty water
Oh, Boston, you’re my home (oh, yeah)

Because I love that dirty water
Oh, oh, Boston, you’re my home (oh, yeah)

Well, I love that dirty water (I love it, baby)
I love that dirty water (I love Baw-stun)
I love that dirty water (Have you heard about the Strangler?)
I love that dirty water (I’m the man, I’m the man)
I love that dirty water (Owww!)
I love that dirty water (Come on, come on) [fade]
-Song: Dirty Water by the Sandells

What an exciting night. Others will tell the story better than me, so I’ll leave it to them. The perspective of victory in our house is different among each of us. For me it represents fair play, community, faith, and good clean fun. In an election year with promises, confrontations, lies, and war this is a welcome intersection of joy and faith. I’m not sure that it represents anything particularly American, just human. To see people hugging and crying and screaming in the streets – it’s hard not to be joyous. There is nothing holding anyone back, not race, politics, or money. Bostonians have carried this weight for so many years it is tied into the psychology of the city. As I’ve said in other posts, I’m not sure you can understand it until you live here (at least I didn’t, and I’m not even a huge sports fan). It’s one of the biggest (if not the biggest) sports cities in the nation. We have four professional teams in each of the major leagues. People are crazy about it. Games are packed during the regular season. Red Sox fans have been loyal and undying. For God’s Sake it’s been 86 years!! As my coworkers 14-year old son said, “This is the best day of my life; but think about how happy all the old people must be.”

Okay I’m in serious need of some knitting guru help. I am a moron. This is not new news. However, I can add another reason for this esteemed quality to my list. I failed to purchase enough yarn for Sister’s Banff, A LOT less yarn. The pattern requires something like 700 yards. How many did I get? 524 yards. Moron. To my credit…the yardage on label is off on the Araucania Nature Wool Chunky. However, it’s not ~175 yards off. The most embarassing part? I actually brought a calculator with me to the store!

I had such a difficult time imagining that I actually did this that I spent part of the evening digging through my growing pile o’ yarn thinking that I must have lost it. Then I remembered…there is proof in the pudding. The pudding is my blog and the proof is this picture:

Remember the Columbus Day Windsor Button Sale and this stash? Count the pinky skeins. Count them again. Get out your calculator. Punch in the number you count, the multiplication button, and then the yardage (131). What do you get? 524. Moron.

This morning I made the call. I am now one of those, “I didn’t purchase enough yarn” callers. Windsor Button has come to the partial rescue of my moron soul. They have two skeins of the same dye lot. This is barely enough if the yardage was right and if I wasn’t using A LOT of yarn on just one sleeve.

Pray tell, what do I do now? I know that I can get the same color different lot at another LYS. Should I get those skeins too? The skeins are hand-dyed…does this make a difference? How do I integrate them into the sweater? Do I just give up? Do I forage ahead and hope for the best? I think I could alter the neck if needed. I’m just about done with one sleeve at this point, a sleeve that took a long time to knit because I had to frog just about every hour. I abhor the thought of ripping the whole thing out and choosing a different yarn (frankly, I can’t afford it either).

Help?!

And my toes are cold damnmit!

I have a horrible habit of taking off my shoes and leaving them all over the house. I admit this. All former roommates have received fair warning. I usually am good about kicking them to the curb and not leaving them in the MIDDLE of the room. However, my husband does not agree. I swear he hides them. I can never find any shoes. Every morning is a mad dash for my shoes. He recently disclosed one of the jails in which he keeps them – under the coffee table. Our coffee table is as big as a coffin. It’s ridiculously huge, so huge that our family room is mostly couch and then all coffee table. It can hide a lot of shoes.

I looked there. No slippers. Who ate my slippers?

I had to compromise….

Did yah notice I couldn’t even find a matching pair?!

Stumble out of bed. Trip over dog. Brush hair, brush teeth. Make sure toothpaste doesn’t end up on hair brush. Make Coffee. Deodorant. Sweater. Jeans. Socks. Shoes. Keys. Where are the damn keys? Hat. Scarf. Knitting. I could work on this. Or this. Or that. Okay this secret present. Outside. Damn it’s dark out. Walk to train. Hmm, feeling awake now. No bus in site. Keep walking. Morning is brisk. No, Metro, thank you. Smile. Big clock tells me I’m late. Run to turnstile. Slam into turnstile. This, thing, won’t budge, owww. What the hell? I don’t have time for this. Damn T. Stop to realize that indeed, you have to pay for entrance into the train. Hold sore hip, backup and dig through bag for Monthly Pass. Easily slide through turnstile. Sit on train and humbly accept that it’s Monday Again.

Husband Robby woke up this morning and said, “I think I have a sports hangover.” We’re exhausted, but pretty excited. This is a fun time of the year. It’s even more fun to feel the energy and spirit in Boston. Cars honking in the street, people screaming. I can’t imagine what it must be like for the long time fans. I never really understood this Red Sox thing until last year. I don’t know what it is. But the chip is big and the sholders are strong. I wonder if the city will deflate a bit now? A week to go.

Speaking of which. We’ve still got one more team to pull for. The Astros are playing Game 7 tonight. Rob is a long time fan. While packing the house to move last year we came across his “baseball” notebook from when he was a kid. He cut out headlines from newspapers, drew the players, etc. It’s all things Astros. They’ve never been to the playoffs, never been to a World Series. Go Astros!

On to knitting….

I’ve begun the Christmas Knitting in earnest. This is my first Knittable Christmas. I didn’t learn until January of this year. I’ve got a secret birthday/holiday present on the needles right now. I’m way short on yarn….I’ll be doing a bit of improvising. I’ll fill you in later.

I swatched for another birthday/holiday present. It’s for my sister. I think I can blab about because I’m pretty sure she hasn’t found me here yet. In a few months she’s be the proud owner of Banff. The pattern can be found on Knitty, although I’m using the Knit Wit version. It may have been reworked a bit, I’m not sure. I’m substituting the pattern yarn with Araucania Nature Wool that was purchased at Windsor Button’s Columbus Day sale. (I didn’t buy it here, but you can check out the yarn. The closest color is #4, the skeins I have are MUCH lighter.) The color is awesome. I stood in that store for a least an hour with four different colors in my hand. I chose a pinky/salmon color. I made the right choice. It’s hand dyed and the subtle color change is pretty cool on the swatch. I haven’t taken pictures yet…this weekend in the daylight.

I’ll have you know that I’m taking this swatching process very seriously. Robby’s Big Sack is too small for him and my shapely tank had to have the crap blocked out of it. The madness has to stop. I’m going to get this right if it kills me. I cracked the binding on a new journal last night and wrote down the needle size, the pattern gauge, and my pre-blocked swatch gauge (measured three times). I then dunked the swatch and left it to dry over night. Pre-dunk I had a few too many stitches per inch (my row gauge was right on). The swatch loosened up quite a bit after washing. I haven’t measured yet but I’m keeping my fingers crossed. I’m nervous about yardage and don’t want to “waste” any more yarn.

This is going to be a quickie. Life is interrupting today. Blech. Stupid Life.

Okay. This question was posed to me: If you had to recommend 5 titles (of books) to SELL to someone what would they be?

Now this is a different question than: What are five books you would recommend? Selling books isn’t easy, mostly because you’re dealing with a stranger. The easiest thing to do is find out what they have liked in the past. It’s also good to try and get some clue about a persons political/social inclination. No sex books for the nuns, ‘kay? You also want to do a good job. You want them back. You want them to validate your weird sense of humor and bizarre taste in books. You should aim for something a little off the beaten track. Anyone can pick up books like, The Lovely Bones without a personal recommendation – it was all over the media.

Two books that fit the example of books that I would recommend but wouldn’t necessarily sell to a total stranger: Blindness by Jose Saramago and/or The Sparrow by Maria Doria Russell. These are fabulous books. However, they’re not for everyone. If you’re up for the emotional commitment of either – you should read them. You also should be a little open minded when reading The Sparrow there is some “questionable content” there.

I did some work on my side bar. I am now the proud owner of a Bookish Girl Button!

You can be too. Just save it on your own server, ‘kay? Links are also updated. Yes, I know I have a bloglines problem. I will go to every depth to procrastinate. In fact, as a freshman in college my roommate Emily (of yesterday’s Birthday Fame) and I made a list of ways to procrastinate. Procrastinating procrastinating. Is that a disease?

Another finished object for you:

This is the seventh of eight. Yes, you read that right; I knit seven of these suckers. Way back when I was a naive and optimistic knitter I decided that I wanted to knit gifts for my bridesmaids. Well, I had an obscene number of bridesmaids. Our wedding was pretty casual. However, our wedding party was huge. It was awesome. All of my roommates from college surrounded me, along with my long time girl friends (first attached to one another when we were 12)! They Rock.

as if you haven’t had enough of the wedding pictures….but ain’t they beautiful?!

Anyway, my point is… the task proved more difficult than I had expected. I finished 6 of the 7 before the wedding. Two received yarn for a gift! As of last week, I’ve only got one to go!

Project Details

The pattern is free and can be seen here. It’s straightforward and easy. The Deco Ribbon is fun to knit with. The colors are great. I used the following (2 of each): Strawberry, Orange Crush, Lemonade, and Key Lime. While it was fun, I’m a wee bit sick of it. Go figure, seven bags and counting will do that do you.

Modifications: For the handle I choose to do a long cast and then immediately cast off. I hate I-cords. I just don’t have the patience for pulling the stitches tight, and I ALWAYS get ladders. If I knit these again (which I won’t because it would drive me to insanity) I would give the bags liners. The seed stitch is relatively dense but it’s not dense enough to balance the elastic nature of the Deco Ribbon.

And now… just for Jackie… this blog has added Chocolate:

These are Molly Pops. Has anyone been acquainted with a Molly Pop?

Chewy Molasses Peppermint Nougat on a stick covered with our rich Chocolate

They are awesome, truly incredible. The creator, Oliver’s, is located near my Grandma’s house. These were my uncle’s favorite treat. Growing up I always managed to snag one from him. Well, the heavens shine above me. There now an Oliver’s near my parents’ house! Guess where I’m going over Thanksgiving? If you’d like to experience the pleasure, they can be ordered online.

ps – I’m not going to say this too loud…but did anyone else notice that when I added the “stupid Red Sox link” to my sidebar, they won? Reverse psychology…the link isn’t going anywhere.

(this is one of the few digital photos I have of us!)

Today is my friend Emily’s Birthday! Happy Birthday Emmy. She has survived 10 years of my friendship. Wow. Ten years. We were roommates all through college. Placed together randomly and now still best friends. She was in my wedding and was able to create the most beautiful hairdo ever – on the fly. She is unfailing in her loyalty, support, and commitment to me and all of those around here. I love her dearly and wish her the best day ever!

Watch out for monkeys Em, don’t let them ever take the wheel!